294. THE VARIOUS ACCOUNTS , | N°. 74. | 
jecture and surprise. It gives me more confidence in making the 
above statement, as one of the seamen, whose name in Jonathan 
Townsend, was in the main top, and saw the creature I have 
described, and would feel no hesitation in taking an oath to it. — 
George Sanford, Lieutenant R. N.” 
[“Copied from a memorandum-book of Lieut. Sanford , and com- 
municated by Dr. Scott, of Exeter. There is no date to the above 
statement, but it 1s presumed to have been written about the year 
1820. iter Sanford then commanded a merchant-shtp, the Lady 
Combermere. — EH. N.’| 
No doubt the latitude of 46 degrees is northern lat., so that 
the appearance occurred in the Bay of Biscay. — The act of breath- 
ing of the sea-serpent, after having remained for some time under 
the surface of the water, just.as in whales, has an appearance 
generally called “spouting”. Apparently the animal held its head 
just at water-level, and so it showed “nothing where the water 
issued from’. The rugged appearance may have been caused by 
the animal lymg with several bunches on its back, as afterwards 
was also reported by the Lloydsteamer Adtze (n°. 154) or by its 
having a mane, extending all along the neck and back. The “hump | 
from one extreme resembling the rise or point of rather a triangular 
rock’’ must have been the animal’s head which it lifted up just 
above the surface. Nearly the same appearance will be observed in 
the figure of one of the officers of H. M. 8. Plumper (fig. 31). 
Let the dimensions moreover be somewhat exaggerated, the “head 
and neck resembling something of a serpent’s erected about six 
feet above the surface of the water’, the “taking a survey towards 
the vessel”, and the vanishing at once, makes all comment super- 
fluous; all these characters have more than once been reported of 
this creature. 
In the Philosophical Magazine and Journal, Vol. LVII, 1821, 
we find an extract from the numerous reports communicated by 
Prof Bigenow in Sittuiman’s American Journal of Science and the 
Arts, Boston, Vol. Il, 1820, May. 
We have already quoted Minton, who in his Paradise Lost, 
printed in 1667, campares Satan with some huge monsters, amongst 
others the sea-serpent. Parts of these verses have been more than 
